The Case of the Lazy Lover (23 page)

"Then what happened?"

"Well, then, the next day this man Mason came and there was a party with him, and a woman that said she was this man's wife, and everything seemed to be all honky-dory, so they had a grand family reunion with a lot of billing and cooing, and this woman seemed just crazy to get her husband away from there and that was okay by me."

"In other words, you accepted everything at its face value?"

"I still thought the guy was hot," Overbrook said, "but I wasn't sticking my neck out."

"So they went away?"

"That's right."

"Then what happened?"

"Well," Overbrook said, "nothing happened, until the next morning."

"And then?"

"Well, about daylight the next morning I began doing a lot of thinking. I remembered noticing Fleetwood's tracks and I thought I'd see if I couldn't back-track him a ways."

"Now this was Wednesday morning?"

"That's right."

"So what did you do?"

"Well, I started out and picked up Fleetwood's tracks, and then I back-tracked him. I was careful not to step in his tracks. I just walked along…"

"On this diagram," Danvers interrupted, "there's a line of dots which are labeled FLEETWOOD'S TRACKS TO THE HOUSE."

"That's right. Those are his tracks."

"And another line of dots going in an opposite direction labeled OVERBROOK'S TRACKS FOLLOWING FLEETWOOD'S TRAIL."

"That's right."

"And those are your tracks?"

"Yes, Sir."

"Now those tracks follow along parallel with the tracks left by Fleetwood?"

"Yes, Sir. I back-tracked him down to where the car had stopped, and I started to circle around and then all of a sudden I seen these tracks where a woman had jumped out of the automobile and run back to the highway, and then I looked and saw a woman's tracks coming back again from the highway and getting in the automobile apparently to drive it off. So I knew I'd better call the officers. It looked like a woman had been shut up in the luggage compartment."

"So then what did you do?"

"Well, I kept right on walking to the hard ground without looking around any. You can see where these tracks of mine circle right up into the high ground up here. I have a farm road up there that runs out to my grain field."

"A farm service road?"

"Yes, sir."

"And what did you do?"

"I walked up to that road and went back to the house and kept thinking things over; so then I took my tractor and trailer and loaded on a lot of scrap lumber, so people could get out there without messing things up any, and put the lumber down."

"How did you put it down?"

"Why the way a person would put down lumber so as to save tracks that way. I'd put down a board and then walk out along that board and put down another board and then walk out along that board and put down another board until I had boards all the way out to where the car had stopped, and then I walked back along the boards, got in my tractor and drove back to my house, got my jalopy out of the shed and drove in to where there was a telephone. I called the sheriff and told him that I'd been putting up a man that said he had amnesia and I thought he might be hot and that I'd tracked him out to where he'd parked his automobile and, sure enough, I'd found there'd been a woman in the back end of the car and she'd jumped out and run down to the highway, and then after a while apparently she'd sneaked back and picked up the car and driven off."

"At that time had you heard of Allred's death?"

"No, sir. I hadn't."

"Cross-examine," Danvers said.

Mason smiled reassuringly at the witness.

"So Fleetwood came to your place on Monday night and was there until sometime Tuesday?"

"That's right; until you came and got him."

"During that time he stayed in the house?"

"Not all of the time"

"You didn't stay in the house?"

"Me? No. I was out around the place doing chores."

"You left Fleetwood alone there?"

"Some of the time, yes."

"Fleetwood could have walked away and gone anywhere he wanted to?"

"Sure."

"You didn't tell the dog to guard him then?"

"No, the dog was with me."

"You and the dog are quite close?"

"I'm fond of him and he's fond of me."

"He accompanies you wherever you go?"

"Everywhere," Overbrook said, "except when I've got some job for him to do like watching somebody or something. Aside from that, my dog's with me all the time."

"The dog is loyal to you and devoted?"

"Yes."

"And you could have left him to watch Fleetwood and the dog would have kept him there?"

"Sure, but I couldn't have done it without Fleetwood knowing what I was doing."

"And you didn't want to do that?"

"It didn't seem exactly hospitable."

"Weren't you afraid Fleetwood would steal something and…"

Overbrook's grin was slow and good-natured. "Mr. Mason," he said, "the stuff I got out in my cabin isn't the stuff a man like Fleetwood would steal. I've got a little bacon and some flour and a little salt and some baking powder. I have some blankets and some cots to put 'em on, but – well, Mr. Mason there isn't anything there for anybody to steal. I live kind of simple, myself."

Mason said, "It didn't occur to you to back-trek Fleetwood to see where he came from until Wednesday morning?"

"Well, I just kept thinking things over all the time. Things kept churning around in my mind and I couldn't get them straightened out. The way you folks had showed up and taken this man away with you, and all this stuff, I just couldn't get the thing out of my mind. So I started looking around and then just as soon as I seen the tracks made by this woman – you could see she was running."

"Even without walking over to where the tracks were?"

"Yes, sir. People that live out in the country the way I do get so they're pretty good at telling things about tracks, and the minute I saw these tracks, even without walking over to them, I could see that a woman had got out of that automobile and had really high-tailed it down the road; and then I saw where she'd come back and she was walking slow and easy like when she came back. So I decided I'd just better tell the sheriff about the thing."

"So then what did you do?"

"Just what I told you."

"Now, would it have been possible for any person to have gone out to that automobile without leaving tracks?"

"Not in the ground that's around that automobile. No, sir. There's kind of a seepage there and the ground is nearly always soft for quite a little while after a rain."

"Did you find the gun?"

"Yes, sir, I did."

"When?"

"Well, that was after the sheriff got out there and we looked the tracks over a bit and the sheriff asks me to tell him what I could about them, and I noticed the tracks made by this man Fleetwood when he got out from behind the steering wheel of the automobile and walked around the front of the car. I could tell from those tracks that about the time he got even with the headlights, he'd turned around and done something, and the way the right foot was sort of smudged, I figured that he'd heaved something or thrown something and told the sheriff about it. So, the sheriff and I, we went out in the hard ground and started looking around and found it. It just happened I was the one that found the gun."

"And what happened? Did you pick it up?"

"Not me," Overbrook said, grinning. "I'd read enough detective stories so I know about fingerprints. I just called the sheriff and told him the gun was over there, and the sheriff didn't pick it up. Not then. We got a stake and drove it into the ground where the gun was lying, and lien the sheriff got a piece of string and slipped it through the trigger guard on the gun and pulled it up so he didn't touch it. That way we didn't smudge any fingerprints that were on it. I heard afterwards that they'd found…"

"Never mind what you'd heard," Danvers said, interrupting. "Just tell Mr. Mason the facts."

"Yes, sir."

"I think that's all," Mason said.

'That's our case, Your Honor," Danvers said "You're resting?" Mason asked, with some surprise.

"Certainly," Danvers said.

"I move that the Court dismiss the case and free the defendant from custody," Mason said. 'There is no evidence sufficient to show that she is in any way connected with what happened."

"On the contrary," Danvers said. 'There's every evidence. We have to go through with this every time, Your Honor, but I suppose I may as well point out for the sake of the record what we have. We now have the testimony of witnesses showing that Allred was unconscious in an automobile, that Mrs. Allred was in the luggage compartment of that automobile. These tracks can't lie. The person who was in the luggage compartment of that automobile go out and ran to the highway. Then after a while she turned around and went back to the car, got in it and drove away. The unconscious form of her husband was in the car at that time. He couldn't have recovered consciousness and left the car without leaving tracks. You can see from this diagram of tracks where the car was backed, turned and driven back to the roadway, headed in the direction of the main mountain road.

"I have a lot of other evidence that I can introduce, but the object of the defense counsel at this time is to force me to show all of my hand without showing any of his, and then when the case comes up for trial in the superior court, he will be in a position to have me at just that much of a disadvantage.

"'The only object of this preliminary hearing is to prove that a crime has been committed, and to show there is reasonable ground for believing that the defendant committed that crime. I claim I have abundantly met the requirements of the law."

"I think so," Judge Cotton said. "The motion is denied. Does the defense have any evidence at all it wishes to introduce?"

Mason said, "I notice that George Jerome is in court, and yet he was not called as a witness."

"I didn't need him."

"I'll call him as my witness," Mason said.

"Now then, Your Honor," Danvers protested. "This is an old trick, and it's just a trick. The lawyer for the defense knows that his client is going to get bound over, so he doesn't care what happens in this court. He isn't bound by it. Therefore, he calls people and goes on fishing expeditions and…"

"I understand the basic rules of courtroom tactics," Judge Cotton said, smiling, "but I don't think you would claim, Counselor, that Mr. Mason does not have a right to call any person whom he wishes as a witness."

"No, Your Honor, but I do want to point out that George Jerome will be a prosecution witness and, in the event Mr. Mason puts him on the stand, I want Counsel to be confined to the examination of this witness according to the strict rules of evidence. I don't want him to start cross-examining the witness."

"When and if that happens, you may object," Judge Cotton said. "In the meantime, George Jerome is called to the stand as a witness for the defense."

Jerome was sworn, looked somewhat angrily at Mason as he settled his huge frame there on the witness stand.

"Your name is George Jerome. You're a partner, or were a partner, of Bertrand C. Allred?"

"Yes, sir."

"You were, of course, quite well acquainted with Albert during his lifetime?"

"Yes."

"When was the last time you saw him alive?"

"Objected to as incompetent, irrelevant and immaterial," Danvers said.

"Overruled."

"Well, it was, let me see. It was Monday evening about -- oh about half-past six o'clock, I'd say."

"Where?"

"Now you mean the last time I saw him?"

"Yes."